Press Statement

Shortly after the 7.7 magnitude earthquake hit central Burma on March 28th, the military junta launched airstrikes and carried out offensive operations in different parts of the country, including in earthquake devastated areas. The military junta’s repeated airstrikes and ground offensives are compounding the severe humanitarian crisis that survivors and affected communities of the earthquake are facing. Between March 28 and April 8, 2025, a total of 92 airstrikes and offensive operations were carried out across 12 areas, resulting in 72 deaths and 91 injuries, including women and children.

Instead of focusing on enabling aid and rescue efforts, the junta has been obstructing aid and preventing rescue teams from entering areas in need. The impact of the earthquake will disproportionately affect women, children, elderly, and people with disabilities. Internally displaced persons and communities impacted by the earthquake are in urgent need of food, clean water, and sanitation and hygiene kits.

We call on the international community to:

• Provide emergency support and humanitarian aid to communities affected by the earthquake and IDPs through local organizations and cross border channels. Increase funding and logistical support to grassroots organizations and local networks already operating on the ground.
• Ensure the provision of aid includes the needs of marginalized groups, including women and girls, such as sanitation and hygiene kits.
• Prioritize women and children: Ensure aid includes maternal healthcare, menstrual hygiene kits, child protection services, and gender-sensitive shelter designs.
• Immediate health interventions: Deploy mobile clinics to provide maternal, pediatric, and trauma care, and prevent outbreaks of diseases in overcrowded camps.
• Psychosocial support: Provide culturally and linguistically appropriate mental health services.
• Be vigilant of the SAC’s attempts to weaponize, misuse or exploit aid. The SAC will attempt to control or divert aid for itself, and will restrict access to areas controlled by resistance groups. This makes working through local pro-democracy actors imperative.
• Be vigilant of the SAC’s deceit and manipulation of the international community. The SAC announced a 20 day ceasefire yet continued to launch airstrikes, highlighting its lack of political willingness to genuinely engage in humanitarian efforts and the clear transgressions between its disingenuous statements and its actions.
• Condemn the weaponization of aid: The junta’s use of access restrictions, airstrikes, and forced conscription as violations of international humanitarian law.
• Impose an aviation fuel embargo. The SAC is continuing to carry out airstrikes, including in areas that are severely affected by the earthquake. Cutting off the SAC’s supply to aviation fuel is critical to saving lives during this already dire humanitarian crisis.

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